um ornson UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. OK Deceived Accessions No. JAN 1895 . 189 . ~. Class No. ffiv UNIVERSITY mi X FROM PHOTO BY A. O CARPENTER UKIAH, CAL. v > , &&) H LATER POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED IN ONE VOLUME TBDS UNI7BRSITY SAN FRANCISCO J. STUART & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS 1891 COPYRIGHT 1891 BY ANNA MORRISON REED LAYTCNVILLE. CAL. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED PRINTED BY P. M. DIERS &. CO., SAN FRANCISCO. TO THE MEMORY OF MY MOTHER. CONTENTS A GOLDEN DREAM IN MEMORY OF LEON 21 ANTE-MORTEM 54 BROWNING 3I CHRISTMAS, 1890 I9 DEATH OF GENERAL GRANT A MONODY . 44 DEATH OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD A MONODY 2 FRAGMENTS 32, 42 GERTRUDE AND THEODORE i 3 GOOD FRIDAY I? HER KING T "I Do BEGRUDGE TO TIME" 48 "I PASS HER GRAVE" 25 "I THIRST" 27 J UNE 37 LOVE S MAGIC SEAL 33 "MILES ARE BETWEEN Us" 3 6 MOTHER A REVERIE 6 "My LIFE is DEVOTED TO MEMORIES OF You" 28 "No BABES IN ARMS" A SATIRE 3 o ODE TO PROGRESS PRIZE POEM 34 RETROSPECT I2 SACRAMENTO , 52 SONNETS 3<D) 3 8 SUNSET . l6 THE ECLIPSE 2g "THE GLADDEST HEART" 5I To A CHARMING PORTRAIT OF A GYPSY MAIDEN 49 To THE NATIVE SONS OF THE GOLDEN WEST 26 To THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 43 WASHINGTON 1789-1889 WASTED UNIVERSITY THE LATER POEMS OF . :*. ~ ANNA MORRISON REED WINSOME maiden planned her life- How, where she was her hero s wife,\<Yw He should be royal among men, And worthy of a diadem. Through all the devious ways of earth She sought her king; The snows of Winter fell before She walked o er flowers of vanished Spring; Into the Summer s fragrant heat She bent her quest, with rapid feet, Then saddened ; still she journeyed down The Autumn hillsides, bare and brown, Through shadowy eves and golden morns ; And lo she found him crowned with thorns. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. of Presibent A MONODY READ IN UKIAH, CALIFORNIA, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 26TH, 1881 (From the Ukiah Dispatch and Democrat.) MKS. ANNA M. REED then stepped to the front and read the following eloquent and most beautiful monody on the death of him who has gone from earth s scenes of toil and trouble to the realms of everlasting life, where " the wicked cease from troubling" and the "weary be at rest;" there where "the small and the great" are gathered. The reading was almost faultless, and the impression made was one of deep solemnity. The sentiments are those of a truly Christian heart, and the pathos therein contained awakened the tenderest emotions. all the bells! a great soul s passed away From clouds and shadows to the perfect day ; The wasted garment that is left behind Must be to ashes and to dust consigned. The tears of suffering death has wiped away, But who shall dry the eyes of those who stay The aged mother and the faithful wife? The children wailing for that ended life ? The nation calling for the leader slain, Who long weeks languished on his bed of pain? Toll all the bells, beat low the muffled drum ; In long procession mourning millions come To honor him who, in a land of laws, By lawless hand has died, without a cause. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. Beside the ocean, that, with measured surge, Chanted his first and grandest funeral dir-e o o Sublimest minstrel at the feet of God; It still sang on, while fell the mystic rod And moaned a requiem for the parting soul, Soaring beyond this little world s control. No human voice may sing of him so well, Nor all the grandeur of his history tell ; But to his memory, out of many lands, Will struggling genius lift aspiring hands To him who fortune s darkest frowns withstood, And kept his every aim still great and good Who reached the summit of the hill of fame With life unblemished and unsullied name A grand rebuke to every weaker heart That tempted, turneth from the better part ; Reproaching those who, like the one of old, Their birthright for a "mess of pottage" sold. His mind, untrammeled, was as broad as Earth; His heart was centered at his family hearth He made his home a type of all things^seem Of which the honest Christian soul can dream, Fit emblem of that home in fairer lands Where mansions wait, not built by .humanhands. OS IHK 4 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. The annals of the past one truth repeat Of those, whose lives with greatness were replete This fact, more eloquent than all beside, Whate er their history, they all have died. Sceptre or crown, the pride of place or power To frail mortality loaned but for an hour, When death had pointed to the solemn bier, They learned the mockery of all things here ; Sowing that others might the harvest reap, Along the wayside they have gone to sleep Tired of the treasures that the years may rust, Tired of the things that are but sordid dust, [steal, Tired of the gold that thieves break through and Tired of the wrongs successive years reveal The graves of such, like landmarks, strew the sod, Pointing submission to the will of God. But though the souls of men like him we mourn On waves of mystery are beyond us borne A grateful world their names perpetuate, And well may strive their deeds to emulate ; For though they drift beyond the tides of fame, We feel, indeed, they have not lived in vain. A proud inheritance has this one left POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. To all his loved ones and the land bereft His pure example may the world defy His glorious principles can never die; Nor that so blessed and so heaven-sent, On which its authors based our government, Where earnest manhood, by its simple worth, Depends not on the accident of birth By honest labor, without gold to buy, May earn and reach its stations proud and high. Oh ! let the flags droop low toll all the bells ; We lay him down amid our last farewells. Under the earth, with loving tributes dressed, Do we resign him to his lasting rest ; c!3 O And to Columbia, still safe and free, We trust the honor of his memory; As turns his sacred clay to kindred sod, His martyred spirit finds repose with God. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 51 N the brush fence by the lane I hear the stormbirds crying, And I know the winter rain Soon will beat where thou art lying; For the wind and rain are near, When the stormbirds are a-crying. A brave, bright, winter rose Taps the window where I m sitting; Its heart with beauty glows, While the autumn hours are flitting; It taps the silent pane Of the window where I m sitting. The south wind kisses light o Its petals, curved and folded, Like a picture warm and bright, Close in the heart enfolded Like a dream of love and youth, In the heart of age enfolded. And it speaks to me of thee, While the stormbirds are a-crying, POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. Though thy face I cannot see, Thy memory is lying In the winter of my heart, Best, brightest and undying. I dream of thee so dear, Before the woodfire glowing ; I hear the herd-bells clear, And the cattle softly lowing ; The sounds foretell the rain, While the fire is brightly glowing. In thought I pass the lane Where stormbirds are a-crying, As to some sacred fane, To the grave where thou art lying, Through fragrant pine-wood aisles Where the sunset glow is dying; Where one can not hear the noise Of a footfall on the mosses; Where the pine leaves lightly poise Like a pile of russet flosses; Where the rabbit or the squirrel, With silent footstep, crosses; Where the brake, with quiv ring fronds, Beside the gravestone whispers POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. The earliest matin songs, And at eve the sadder vespers, That the night wind softly taught The leaves to chant in whispers. There so quietly you sleep, While the restless winds are sighing, In the grave so dark and deep, Nor heed the stormbircls crying, Nor the tears that fall like rain, And my heart within me dying. The rose taps on the pane, And the stormbircls are a-crying, And I soon will hear the rain Beat through the wind s low sighing, While rose leaves flutter clown On the grave where thou are lying. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED, 1789-1889 CROSS a century of change We reach our hands to thee Toward one bright and changeless thing, Thy honored memory. Along the battlements of Time No hero lived and died Whose name in song- and deathless rhvme O J Is uttered with such pride. It stirs the heart of free-born men, And whispers to the slave The truths that e en make eloquent The silence of thy grave. OF No stain was on thy grand careefl.0 I V EH 51 Of lust, or pride or greed ; -ri 1 i j i I hy sword was never bared because Of some unhallowed creed. 10 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. O Washington ! if from the realms Of perfect love and light The immortal thought of one like thee May earthward take its flight, Look down upon this land to-day Across from sea to sea Thy great soul will be thrilled to know How much we honor thee. We ask in thy dear name to be Made faithful to our trust, And lay our wreaths of immortelles Upon thy sacred dust. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 11 MOT Time, that sacred heritage to all, For in the cycles that have passed away I cannot count me one lost, idle day, Nor opportunity; to fate s most meager gift, I have been eager, heart and hand to lift. What waste could then my faithful life befall ? A cheek whose roses bloomed for eyes so blind, They did not see they were the rarest kind ; Words that the world had listened for for years, Falling unanswered on the dullest ears ; A heart worn out as fond as ever beat, Its wine of life spilled at unworthy feet ; A soul so tortured, as years come and go, Its wasted treasure, God alone can know. 12 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. Retrospect is a witching- mem ry my heart so oft recalls A silver cornet ringing above the palace walls, Where from a draperied window a bright young face looked down Upon my lady s garden that graced Yokaya s town. Where passion flower and jasmine diffused a fra grant balm ; o Where shone the brilliant salvia and whispered pine and palm ; The willow o er the fountain, with fingers long and slim, Reached to the sparkling water that kissed the fretted brim, And many a woodland songster, awearied with the heat, Bathed in the cooling crystal and sang his matin sweet. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 13 O days, whose dawn s pink splendor waxed to a golden noon ! O perfume, song and blossom, in life s impassioned rune ! O south wind, blowing gently the petals at my feet ! O twilight, stealing over! O kisses, rare and sweet! O little maiden, singing beside the stately hall ! O silver cornet, ringing above the palace wall ! CJertrube cmb A LAY OF YE MODERN KNIGHT AND LADY FAIR. ITH a ring of hoofs I heard them pass, As the horses spurned the brittle grass ; A youth and maid of our modern time, On the morning side of life s sweet prime. Active and graceful, and fair and young As any that poet has ever sung ; No knight of old, with spurs bedight Could be to me a braver sight, E en though he went with plume and glove To joust for the sake of his lady love. 14 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. And she what maid of olclen time, Extolled in song or praised in rhyme, Compares with her, whose form and face Are perfect in their winsome grace? They rode through the waning Summer s hours, Where the sunlight sifted in golden showers Through the woodland aisles in a solemn hush, Through the firs and pine and hazel brush, And down by the lessening river s brim Where the sedge, with fingers long and slim, Reached to the waters, clear and cool, And dabbled in each shadowy pool. Across their path the startled deer Bounded away with a sudden fear; The grouse, from the shade of the deepest wood, Drummed and called to their mottled brood. Again and again was softly heard The tender fretting of some bird That o er her nest, in a shy alarm, Hovered, to keep her young from harm ; The twittering quail to cover sped, The silent rabbit as quickly fled. They rode away through the pathways dim To the redwood forest s farthest rim. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 15 While the sun sank down in the Golden West And rested awhile on the ocean s breast, Into the forest, darkly dim I dreamed of them she dreamed of him And he not on the tented field, Where there s on y a life to take or yield- Will this knight of mine his battle wage ; But amidst the strife of this wond rous age, Where swords are rusting, while gallant men Reach nobler vict ries by tongue or pen ; Where the proudest destiny ever sought Is to rule a king- in the realm of thought. <"> <"> And what of her? O God above! Keep her, and shield and crown with love; The only thing of this world a part That is worth the price of a woman s heart. They have ridden away through the rosy light Ridden away from sound and sight ; Fairer than ever was writ or suncr o To the clang of hoofs their laughter rung. Into the future, dim and unknown, They will go on but I am alone, Dreaming of them from the world apart Their laughter echoes against my heart. .16 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. JJunset E evening s genius with his sworcl of flame Guards well the portal of the dying clay ; His lance of light he strikes against the hills, Upon the highest breaks its glancing ray ; He marshals grandly on a crimson sea His cloudship navy s golden argosy, Whose flaunting banner in the sunset glow Bids brave defiance to the dark ning foe ; Who, swift advancing, o er him softly flings The purple shadow of the twilight s wings, Till war s red flush before the night wind s breath Fades out into the sullen gray of death, And star-eyed night, prevailing all too soon, Hangs out the silver sickle of the moon. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. (Joob fribay the Saviour died suffered the Cruci fied, Yet could His failing eyes see the repentant s tear, Saying : "In Paradise thou shalt with Me appear." "Father, forgive!" He prayed; such blessed words He said, " They know not what they do." This in the face of death, This for His enemies, asked with His latest breath. Yet do His children now turn from His face and bow, Not to this lowly one ; down to strange gods beside; And in their lust and pride, still is He crucified. How long will they profane His pure and sacred name? Placing His holy sign, His emblems so divine, In midst of mockery, on each unhallowed shrine? "I thirst!" to each poor heart, struck by some poisoned dart, Treading the narrow way ready to faint and fall, 18 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. To the parched lips that cry, earth gives her bitter gall. Oh, let us kneel to-day! kneel in the dust and pray, Cl.ose to His bleeding feet; seeking our soul s relief, In deep repentant grief e en like the dying thief. Jesus, the "Prince of Peace," when shall the striv ing cease ? Dark roll the waves of death ; can we the current stem? Seeing at last Thy face touching Thy garment s hem? Forgive each idle word Thy outraged ears have heard, Each sinful act forgive ; into Thy hands receive At death our sorrowing souls, that they may live. This day the Saviour died suffered the Crucified ; Yet He, the suppliant, heard, and He could pity ing see ; Saying: "In Paradise, to-day, thou shalt be with Me." POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 19 Christmas, 1890 U^HEN, neath the stars of Bethlehem, The angels sang: "Good will to men," And Peace on earth," a promise gave, Since man was ransomed from the grave, All earth, with sweet foreboding, smiled, Because was born a homeless child. A million spires point to the sky Where He, transfigured, took His flight, Toward that great unsleeping Eye, Watching o er death, and sin, and night. For eighteen hundred years has been His triumph most devoutly sung, O er death, and sin, and suffering, In every clime in every tongue. Yet, while the organ grandly swells Within our great cathedral walls, Chime answering chime of silvery bells, Upon the air of Christmas falls. 20 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. Fair women, decked in silk and lace, Go warm and blest to softly pray, And hasten to each sacred place That gladly welcomes Christmas day. Oh, iPrince of Peace, who lived and died ! Oh, why upon this holy morn, When sounds and scenes of reverence tell This was the day that Thou wert born, As from these temples of our pride The happy worshipers have filed, Why, cold and hungry, just outside, Do we still find the homeless child? POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 21 IN MEMORY OF LEON. U^HERE the yellow Feather river Rolled its tide afar, With its fruit, an orange laden, Grew at Bidwell s Bar. There a little maid, one morning, Looking on the scene, Tree and flower and fruit were mingled In a summer dream. Steep the garden terrace steeper Was the mountain side, Where the scarlet trumpet creeper Trailed above the tide. Not more scarlet was the blossom Than her dainty lips, Like twin rose leaves, curved and folded, With exquisite tips. 22 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. And so soft and brown and changing Were her tender eyes, Like a pool seen late in summer Where a shadow lies. In her hands were tiger lilies, Gathered ere the sun Had the time to kiss each chalice- Golden, every one. As she gazed with gentle longing- Through the lambent air, A boy came running down the hillside, Crowned with tawny hair. Blue his eyes yes, blue as heaven, And his form and face Promise bore of manly beauty, In their strength and grace. O er the garden wall he bounded, o Plucking fruit and flower, Tossed them to the little maiden In a fragrant shower. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 23 Blushing, then, she thanked him sweetly, With a glad surprise Dimpling all her smiling features, Shining from her eyes. While a lady from the mansion, High above the tide, " Leon, Leon," softly calling, Called him from her side. * # 4fc * * * # As she bore her treasures homeward Over hill and stream, All her pure young soul was lifted In a sunny dream. Through the future rode to meet her, On a steed so rare, A blue-eyed prince, in royal velvet, With long golden hair. ##::#:*#:*::# And so shrined in her fond mem ry, Lived from day to day, Crowned with curls of rippling splendor, Her own prince alway. 24 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. On life s sea, uneven, drifting, Each the other s face did see Seldom ; and death s fiat falling, Parted them eternally. ******* Not one orange tree, but thousands Grace the plains of Butte, And like sands upon the sea shore Lies their golden fruit. o But one tree, where miners, delving, Left but seam and scar, Crowning all the desolation In the past afar; With its fruit and creamy blossoms, Each a separate star, One no other tree can rival Grew at Bidwell s Bar. And, alas! Time sees the passing Of all, good and fair- Cold his heart low in the grave mold Lies his golden hair. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. \, to and fro Time s wearied slave I 1 I come and go, and pass her grave ; A level lane three roads divide, Where I would fain oft pause beside, I still pass by, on either side. God help me ! As the whip of care Still urges on my lagging feet, No time to pray, no time to greet, And save me ere I quite despair. Since she is lying with the dead, I have no place to lay my head, And weep for all that I have borne. I pass her grave, nor pause to mourn ; My heart alone stays with the dead. 26 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. GO tye Jlattoe p ns of tlje the Native Sons of the Golden West, The genius of this bright century sings, In a land where the kiss of the sun on her breast Gives life to a thousand beautiful things. Where the golden orange and scarlet fire Of fragrant pomegranate blossoms shine ; Where tropical beauty and northern balm Blend in the shadows of palm and pine. To the Pioneer and the Native Son Give honor, O Land of the golden West! One s work is over, but just begun For the other for honor and fame the quest. Happy the homes in a radiant land, And happy the maidens who will be blest, In a country united in heart and hand, By the love of the sons of the Golden West. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 27 To the Native Sons of the Golden West The Century s Genius prophetic sings Not alone of the past, but a future blest By a countless treasure of beautiful things. September 9th, 1890. "1 thirst" " Darling, you may always know that I am as constant as the sun." ^~pHINK you the traveler on the desert waste, Dying of thirst, would stiil refuse to taste When loving hands too gladly offered up To the parched lips the overflowing cup? This have I done; yet with beseeching hands, Famished, my soul cries from life s desert sands. As to the mirage returns the weary eyes, Or as the lost look back to Paradise, So to thy image, from this barren way, My tortured spirit turns day after day. Ere it is yielded, duty-worn and faint, Uttering for thee its hopeless, last complaint, Can it be sin, from this far waste of pain, To crave some token of thy truth again? 28 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. is Jveuoteb to Jj)J[eiTioT a ies of SAILED beneath a burning sun, By coral reefs and isles of balm, Where orange groves and silvery palm By faint spice winds were gently fanned, Until I reached a tropic land. And with three thou and miles between The shores whereon two oceans fret, I bravely said, " I will forget," And there beneath the Southern Cross I crept out in the breathless night ; My heart was breaking, and the stars Shone dimly on my fevered sight Ah ! vain is change of time or place ; In heaven itself I see thy face! POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 29 A ROUND a trackless waste of sky A dead world haunts this world of ours, Upon whose pulseless breast no bird May voice its joy among the flowers Whence life and love and all have fled And left it silent, cold and dead. The only thing that still seems bright, The blessed sun s reflected lio-ht, O The tender radiance so serene That falls in moonlight s silvery sheen. As on my heart these shadowy thoughts Had left the while their sombre trace, A shadow from the weary world Fell over Luna s ghost-like face. 30 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. Bonnet cannot come to me, But with this gift that God has given I can reach out, o er land and sea, O er barriers of earth and heaven, And touch your heart exquisitely. The bird caged with a golden wire Sings not always for those who feed, Supplying every grosser need ; Above the tumult of her fate She listens, and she hears her mate ; She dreams a dream of vanished Springs, She beats her wings, and sings, and sings The world says, " Sweetly sings" but, oh! You hear the undertone of woe. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 31 JjE died in Venice citadel of songs, To which for ages all romance belongs ; At whose proud shrine the poet and the sage Have left the offering of every age. He died in Venice ; but with dreaming eyes, By the Rialto and the Bridge of Sighs; And in and out a hundred water-ways, For years he glided through the perfect clays. He died in Venice ; but through all he dreamed The golden sunshine of Italia streamed, Where centered all those memories that endure Around the home of Tasso and the Moor. He died in Venice, but his work was done Long years before his sands of life were run So ideal days he lived that did beseem The closing visions of a poet s dream. 32 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. He died in Venice, where the lapping sea Kept time to that diviner minstrelsy [fraught With which his gifted soul through time was To live eternal in the world of thought. But the worn garment that is left behind They bear away to rest among its kind, In that far land where, in the Abbey s shade, Beside congenial dust, it will be laid. A poet s love, a poet s life and death, Blest from the earliest to his latest breath ; But of all things that could his age befall, To die in Venice seems the best of all. fragment y Y heart has grown so heavy with the burden of its care, That to Sorrow s gloomy portal I have fled and left no trace ; But like moths from out the clarknes to the light of thy loved face, My thoughts go fluttering ever from the night of my despair. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. FT have I smiled, when in youth s halcyon time, I heard in song, or read in deathless rhyme, How gallant knights, bedight in plume and glove, Had met and fought, and gladly died for love. How ladies, too, and maidens wondrous fair, Had wept, and pined, and died in love s despair; How Guinivere her crown and fame forgot, And sweet Elaine had died for Launcelot ; How Cleopatra, on the storied Nile, Did Antony from all the world beguile ; How brave Colonna mourned beside the sea Her worshiped lord, till death had set her free; How Abelard the cloister vainly sought, And saintly Heloise her vows forgot. Oft then I smiled ; for love, in that bright hour, Seemed to my fancy but a boasted power ; But now these things, prefiguring my fate, But faintly symbol all I know and feel ; Thfe ardent passion, time cannot abate, Since on my soul, love set his magic seal. 34 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. to Progress PRIZE POEM Awarded the gold medal by the Agricultural Association of Lake and Mendocino Counties, 1887. (7JENIUS of this grand century, and guardian of the free, Who can a tribute worthily bring from our hearts to thee? When, neath the Star of Bethlehem, angels sang that blessed morn, " Peace on earth, good will to all men," Progress, thou wert also born. The ages past had never known thee, for man un just oppressed His fellow man; who, suffering, saw might as right confessed. Ask Egypt s hordes, who toiled as helpless slaves To build her kings imperishable graves ; Or Grecian art, that on each heathen fane Left us the dower of some immortal name ; Or Rome s imperial grandeur crumbling down, If it was Progress marked their great renown. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED, 35 No! since the world and all its works began, Have Art and Science been the slaves of man ; Degraded oft, ignoble scopes to fill, To suit the vagaries of the human will. So Freedom s smile o er Superstition s horde Accomplished more than power of fire and sword; While Christian liberty, o er land and sea, Enlightens all, and makes the poorest free ; And things that were but dreams to Greece and Rome, With us to grand realities have grown. A homeless child so touched the human soul, He made the world akin one wondrous whole. His story echoes down the aisles of time, In every language told by tongues sublime; Nor will it cease till every land has heard The precious promise of His sacred word, That truth and justice shall prevail alone Where they are not, Progress, thou art not known. POEMS OF ANNA .MORRISON REED. ettoeen JUILES are between us, and the relentless night Follows the sullen day in sombre flight; Above the pine-woods in the distant west The clouds lie piled, a burden of unrest. I know you love me, but the chains that hold Were forged by destiny relentless cold ; They keep me from you, like a serpent s fold. But I cast all from me, that my fate has wrought, And hasten to you in my anguished thought. Thank God ! no other holds the place I crave On earth, or hidden in the solemn grave No woman rivals me ; whate er has been In this impassioned dream, I only sin. I cannot tell you, hero of my heart, How much I love you when so far apart. The world s best teaching holds us honor, pride But in a dream, unspeaking, by your side, I still may follow, safe from sound and sight, While the relentless day closes in sullen night. .POEMS. OF: ANN A MORRISON - REED. 8? DETWEEN the roses of the May Looks out the radiant face of June; >.... Blushing, she seems afraid to cross The threshold of the Spring so soon ; k While my heart echoes, beat for beat, The tread of her reluctant feet. Passionate languor in her eyes, The kiss of Summer on her mouth I love her harmony of birds I love her soft winds of the South Her cumulus clouds that grandly rise Across the sunlight of her skies. A lily with its laughing lips Opes as she smiles -a star-like shine Thrills me from heart to finger-tips With fragrance of the jessamine ; A clove her gentle note prolongs, Answering the last late robin s songs. As here I fondly weave my dreams, While waiting face to face with June Of you, my darling beautiful As bird-song, blossom and perfume- Lulled on the Summer s slumberous breast, I dream, and know that I am blest. 38 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. Bonnet JyE are so far apart even from ocean to ocean As a nun would tell her beads, only with more devotion, Counting the days when we met, As the chain slips over my fingers, Over each thought of you my heart caressingly lingers. The long, bright lance of the sun, Reaching away from the sunset, Touches my hair and eyes, And the lips you kissed, when you told me, Constant you d always be while the sun in his shining should hold me. The heart and the lips you love, grow warm his red rays under. Constant I know you are, though we are so far asunder. God bless and keep you so on the shore of another ocean As a nun her beads, the hours I tell, only with more devotion. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED, 39 abes In &rms A SATIRE Suggested by seeing the above notice at the entrance to one of our fashionable theatres. HILE Fashion trips within the door That Thespis opens wide before her, Pleasure and Vice, and many more, Beside their goddess quickly enter, Folly comes in, and Crime, her brother All children of the same vile mother ; The courtesan, with painted charms But listen, not "the babe in arms." For Innocence there is no place In all this grand and brilliant throng; Tis well, for on its modest face Blushes must burn for scene and song ; Or, if unconscious, still its cries Might through the tearful silence steal, Marring the sense of ears and eyes That drink the rantings of Camille. Camille, sin-stamped, her life of crime Can never touch an honest heart, 40 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED,. E en painted by the fingers fine Of sentiment and finished art, Forgive all like her, and wish them good, But ask not true, pure womanhood To shed the sympathetic tear Over her guilty, weak career. * * * * * Over the rich man s palace gate Those words might well be placed quite often, When nothing can his craving sate, o fc> . - - His greed for power, and pride of station. Some prince of style, with endless means, Whose social traits a strano-e transition o From when he lived on "pork and beans"- Now swell with limitless ambition. His wife, in fashion s trappings decked, Now leads a band of kindred spirits, Of whom she is the "great elect," To " kettledrums" and other places; Forgetting how, in earlier times, She once scoured kettles in the mines Before she hoisted o er her charms The motto of " No babes in arms." .POEMS. OF ANNA/MORRISON REED. Her fragile health admits no more The cares that earnest woman busy;, Though grand receptions by the score Cannot fatigue, nor dancing weary. " A babe so breaks a mother s rest!-" As all her thousand friends attest, While gossiping their usual way Of husbands who are apt to stray, And have a liking for their club, Where everybody smokes and swaggers, While telling cronies where s the rub In politics and other matters. A bad state of affairs at best, For husbands, wives, and all the rest. No sleep at Nature s fittest time The night filled with unholy revel. What wonder that their faces wear Too oft the look of heartless devils? And men who could have loved, at rest, A baby on a mother s breast To view with interest are agog A "thing" that pets a poodle-dog. 42 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED, The eyes of faith have looked beyond This life, that even at its best Is filled with care and pain untold Its triumphs filled with strange unrest, And pictured an existence grand And glorious in an unknown land, Where all that pure in heart have been As little children enter in. While over all the hopeless dead, Entering at last the gates of doom, That sentence unrevoked and dread, God s fiat traces in the gloom, To meet and blast despairing eyes That turn away from Paradise And read above Hell s wild alarms : u There enter here no babes in arms." i fragment [IN AN ALBUM.] WILL not wish you gold, or love, or fame Too many sins, committed in their name, Sweep through the ages, and with dark surprise Their annals blast the light of artless eyes. Virtue alone can bless and crown your youth, Therefore I consecrate its days to truth. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 43 ttye t(niuersity of L S~t" M ECCA of my tem, youth, Between thy shrine and my sad heart, The years with pallid faces stand And hold us far apart. I reached aspiring hands Hung ring toward thy "mount of light;" God filled them, measuring not my plans He doeth all things right. His tasks appointed well, To idle heart-break not allied, Gave nature as my " Alma Mater" And duty for my guide. But echoes of thy fame Waft by on wings of memory, And day by day my constant thoughts Like prilgrims go to thee. 44 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. of ^eneral Qrant A MONODY READ BY THE AUTHOR AT THE MEMORIAL EXERCISES AT UKIAH, MENDOCINQ COUNTY, CALIFORNIA, AUGUST STH, 1885. HO has not stood within the chilling gloom Where some bright pathway ended in the tomb, And from its portal could no longer trace A future blank, for want of one loved face Then, dazed and broken, blindly faltering back, Resumed the round of life s repellent track ? What family circle has not broken been By this decree, provoked by man s first sin ? This awful mystery ; whose fingers cold Can touch impartially the young or old, Point out the fairest for the fatal dart, And still the beating of the noblest heart. No pride of station and no boast of power Prolongs a life for even one short hour. The cottager or claimant of a throne, On God s great mercy both depend alone ; POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 45 No other power, at last, endures to save, And all distinctions level in the crave. 5 Toil s implement the monarch s royal crown, At that dark threshold are alike laid clown. We come as beggars from the Master s hand, And at life s close, we still as suppliants stand - Oh ! may His mercy, like a mantle, fall At that dread hour, in chanty, on all. What, though our burdens be of pain and care, So great they seem, more than the heart can bear; Be patient still, we all will lay them soon Down by the portals of the quiet tomb; And in the silence of that awful shade, How many a fault to nothingness will fade! The hoarded treasures of the countless years Have been resigned before that shrine of tears. For there, each heart has said a last " good-bye," And broken there is every earthly tie And when we hold the wreaths that triumph gave, We all turn back to lay them on some grave. "* * * # * * * * # What meed of praise what tribute shall we pay To him the nation meets to- mourn to-day? 46 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. Who danger s gauntlet oft in safety ran ; Who lived a hero, but to die a man. He was but human but his faults were few ; His life was honest, and his purpose true. Blame not that noble one, that fortune led His feet where war had made the pathway red His country called; he did her grief assuage, And saved America her heritage. Where wrong- has been, alone, God knoweth best, And there alone His punishment will rest. But no just thought confuses now with him That awful scourging of a people s sin. Over his coffin, sorrowing to-day, Bow d are the vet rans of the blue and gray. Over his grave, unworthy strife will cease, And North and South clasp hands in lasting peace. The flag, whose honor he has saved, hangs low ; And all the land is draped in signs of woe ; And many a cheek with honest tears is wet, Now, that at last his star of life is set. But though the flowers we bring be doomed to fade, And loving hands that weave them shall be laid To moulder back into the common clay, Forgotten like the tributes of this day POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 47 He leaves one thing, that will not be forgot, To live immortal in the people s thought. When liberty, enlightening the world, All false usurpers from their thrones has hurled ; When creeds no more perplex fanatic fools, Who live by rote, and worship God by rules ; When parties die and prejudice is dead And ignorance and in their narrow stead, A people live, by truth and reason led A Christian people o er the whole earth spread Then will the greatness of this man be known ; Though back to dust the monumental stone Has crumbled, his memory will shine Throughout the ages of all coming time. So fear not now, within the Nation s sight, This glorious epitaph of him to write : He leaves, emblazoned on the scroll of fame, The matchless splendor of a deathless name. Of UNIVERSITY 48 -POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 5] DO begrudge to time this lip s fond red, This heart s warm pulse, that beat with hope and truth Through all the years, while lingered yet my youth, By love s assurance most divinely fed. Into the face of pain I bravely looked, Nor shrank before the horrid face of death. While I could hope to meet thy constant eyes, For me life s desert seemed a paradise. But O my darling ! I am sad to-night ; Upon the edge of duty and of care The finer fabrics of my life are worn; My ardent being feels a strange despair That time prevails; and e en for thy dear sake, The heart that was so brave will surely break. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 49 J^ortrait of a oEP 5 E Lines dedicated to the hard-working and poorly-paid artists of California. 1WIY pretty little Gypsy, you ve caused me bitter woe ; But how, my little Gypsy, no man shall ever know. For I shall never tell it, and you will never speak, And so, between the two of us, the secret we will keep. Your eyes are dark and solemn, beneath each raven tress, As though you sought to question the cause of my distress ; And so, although you ve brought me a grief I shall not name, I like to sit and watch you, and I love you all the same. You have never told my fortune, but you comfort and you bless, For your eyes, with tender glances, are like a mute caress, As with fawn-like grace and freedom you stand and look at me, Your lovely arm entwining the sturdy greenwood tree. 50 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. And I thank a kindly Providence that in this age of greed, When every selfish worldling makes gain his only creed, There are a few brave spirits who, in the sordid strife, Catch and hold, with pen or pencil, the lovelier things of life. A bit of charming landscape, an eye alight with love A thought that inspiration has sought and found, above The plane, where many thousands toil and strive till life has flown, To build up, for the thankless, their piles of brick and stone. The hand whose cunning caught you, from fancy or from fact, Whose brush on canvas fixed you, with genius and with tact, My gratitude shall follow along Time s checkered flight, For to me my little Gypsy will bring life-long delight. POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 51 glabbest tyear) E gladdest heart in all the world is mine And yet, like showers that fall aslant the shine Of April suns, and, in a tearful way, Deny the radiant splendor of the day, This sobbing breath these tears upon my cheek, Give sad denial to the words I speak. For in the years betwixt this and the grave, And that long rest its solemn silence brings, While shines for us the blest and constant sun, Through Autumn s sere and flower - encircled Springs, There waits no day that we may call our own Upon this sin-cursed earth the slave of time When I may answer you and tell you why The gladdest heart in all the world is mine. 52 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. ^acramento the moonlight, o er the sidewalk, long the shadows fall, And trace so restlessly their shape upon the con vent wall ; While my heart, with all its longing to that city far and dim, Turns to-night, despite of distance is again with him. And upon his face I see the shadow of the years, As he might, upon my own, read the traces of my tears And still nearer than the nearest I am with him in my thought ; Does my spirit seek his presence, wild with yearn ing, thus unsought? No; and so it reaches, in the night so sweet and still, Over rock and plain and meadow, o er valley land and hill, POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 53 Over all the years of hunger, for the blessing of his smile, And unspeaking lingers near his side a little while. Once, the tide of life all thrilling, in a Summer s night, o Clasped a moment in his arms, I touched the borders of delight ; But I turned, my being shaken, and with faltering, aimless feet, Fled for years the love forbidden, still so strangely sweet. And those waves of feeling, breaking through the cruel years, Leave my heart a hopeless wreck, beneath the current of my tears ; Yet it turns with all its yearning to that city, far and dim, And to-night, all else forgetting, is again with him. 54 POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. &nte [7 HEN this strange garment that my soul has V worn Has burned away beneath the fitful flashes Of that wild fever that no cure has known, Until the heart consumes to coldest ashes "Life s fitful fever," burning with such loss Of thought and feeling earth s diviner treasure, So many precious things among the dross, Their value would a life-time take to measure. When a dust to dust" a strange voice softly says, And sadly drop the valley clods above me, While telling o er the events of my days, Amid the tears of those who think they love me ; If they could know the seeming endless pain That I had passed beyond and died, They would not, surely, wish me back again, Where all that s Christ-like still is crucified. That priceless debt the world cannot repay A child s lost faith in all its vain assurance, POEMS OF ANNA MORRISON REED. 55 The hope that turns toward a brighter day, Through months of toil, and patience, and en durance. This is the sum, too oft, through changing years, Of sacrifice no words may fitly tell ; And so, despite the most regretful tears, We sleep, " after life s fitful fever," well. I have so suffered thus a glad relief Seems possible ; and now, as Time is fleeting, I look where death stands, just beyond my grief, And know that there no pulse of pain is beating ; Where sin, ingratitude, and pride and lust, That have so marred the frail thing I am wearing, Lying beside that poor handful of dust, Are left at last, while I go on uncaring. THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW AN INITIAL FINE OF 25 CENTS WILL BE ASSESSED FOR FAILURE TO RETURN THIS BOOK ON THE DATE DUE. THE PENALTY WILL INCREASE TO 5O CENTS ON THE FOURTH DAY AND TO $1.OO ON THE SEVENTH DAY OVERDUE. :_.,_. 3BEJJH KtMwtt THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 12/i